by James A. Bacon
A half year after Hamas terrorists assaulted Israel, hostility at the University of Virginia toward Israel and Jews is unrelenting, according to parents of Jewish students there. In collaboration with other parents, Julie Pearl complained in a letter Tuesday to Rector Robert Hardie that a “blatant double standard against Jewish students persists at UVA.”
Pearl’s letter was prompted in part by the administration’s response to a recent incident in which a truck with digital billboards rolled through the University displaying messages critical of Hardie. One screen said, “Rector Robert Hardie won’t confront antisemitism” while another said Hardie is “unfit to lead U.Va.” The administration’s reaction was to criticize the slogans and investigate who was behind the stunt, Pearl said.
“How does the billboard incident directed at you merit outrage, an immediate statement of condemnation, and investigative action … while the ongoing harassment and intimidation faced by Jewish students receive no such response?” she asked.
By contrast, University officials have failed to act on formal complaints lodged by Jewish students through the “Just Report It” system, Pearl alleged.
“Responses received have been generic acknowledgments via email, offering assurances of available resources,” said one parent in a statement that Pearl submitted as an attachment to her letter. “Similarly, emails and letters sent to UVA administrators from concerned parents have been met with generic replies leaving the hostile environment unaddressed.”
The lackadaisical response to offenses against Jews contrasts vividly to the administration’s overkill in response to a string of supposed racial incidents in the fall of 2022, none of which turned out to be warranted. When a White man put a noose around the statue of the ancient Greek poet Homer on the Lawn, President Jim Ryan proclaimed the act a hate crime and called in the FBI to find the perpetrator. When the man was finally identified and arrested, he said he was protesting pedophilia.
Pearl’s letter and affidavits from Jewish parents come at a time of increasing tensions at UVA.
In February students voted in a referendum to demand that the UVA endowment divest itself of investments that did business in Israel.
Last week Student Council passed a resolution asking for additional prayer space for Islamic students.
Also last week, The Jefferson Council has learned, an Honor Code complaint was filed against Matan Goldstein, who has been the only Jewish student at UVA willing to speak openly to the media in defense of Israel in its conflict with Hamas. The complaint alleged that Goldstein, who held aloft an Israeli flag during an October 25 SJP rally at the Rotunda steps, lied in an interview to CBS-19 news when he said he had been assaulted.
Goldstein had no comment about the allegations, but The Jefferson Council has learned that he has engaged Gregory Brown of Brown & Gavalier in Charlottesville, the same firm that successfully represented Morgan Bettinger against the University.
The Jefferson Council’s sources within UVA’s Jewish community describe the filing as a reprehensible weaponization of the Honor Code to silence political opponents.
Pearl’s letter included another attachment listing 27 incidents involving students and ten involving faculty that Pearl argued were antisemitic or showed a strong bias toward Palestinians. These included:
- A student advocating for Hitler’s final solution;
- The SJP’s statement in October supporting the wiping out of Israeli villages “by whatever means”;
- Jewish student social events require protection;
- Calls and chants for the removal of an entire country’s population, promoting genocide of Jewish people;
- Assault, such as spitting at Jewish students;
- Jewish students hide their identity out of fear of bullying and harm;
- Posters displaying images of violence taken against Jewish people–the bulldozer used in the 10/7 attack that killed 1,200+ and abducted over 200 more;
- Verbal assault calling a Jewish student a “dirty Jew.”
In the past, UVA students, staff and faculty have been investigated and punished at UVA for saying the wrong thing — not just engaging in hate speech, but committing “microaggressions” — about Blacks, Hispanics, transgenders and other so-called “marginalized” groups. But no such solicitude has been forthcoming for Jewish students, Pearl noted.
Some of the incidents Pearl listed have been reported in the media, but many have not. Jewish students report being subjected to ethnic slurs, including the derogatory term “kike,” which Jews perceive as analogous to the “N” word. Individual Jews have been accused of being Nazis or supporting genocide. A common theme in the list is blatantly one-sided portrayals of the Israel-Palestinian conflict in classrooms.
One incident involved the Halal Kitchen food truck often seen on the Grounds. “On March 1, 2024 an employee of the Halal Kitchen food truck parked on Grounds and asked customers if they supported the Palestinians,” Pearl wrote. “If they answered ‘yes,’ they were told they would receive a discount. This incident was reported to [senior vice president of operations] Colette Sheehy who said someone from the university told the worker to cease and desist.”
In the face of widespread student and faculty hostility toward Israel, University officials have staked out a position of studied neutrality in the face of the increasingly hostile climate toward Jewish students. They are reaching out to Muslims and Jews in private conversations. They’ve established a religious diversity task force to probe religious discrimination. They’ve scheduled an academic lecture series to explore Israeli-Palestinian relations. And they’re investigating complaints of discrimination and harassment.
But even that neutrality is suspect.
During the February-March meeting of the Board of Visitors, some board members repeatedly pressed Hardie to address the issue of antisemitism on Grounds. In a heated confrontation with board member Bert Ellis, he steadfastly refused to discuss the issue in open session, claiming that the board would address “student safety” in closed session.
In other signs of institutional bias, two members of the religious task force created to look into religious discrimination had signed a letter criticizing Ryan for not showing sufficient sympathy to Palestinians in his public statements. No militantly pro-Israeli Jews were appointed to the task force. Also, the lecture series sponsored by the Provost’s office about the Israel-Palestinian conflict, as the Jefferson Council has illumined, lined up speakers heavily skewed in sympathy toward the Palestinians.
“We urge you and the rest of the Board of Visitors to take proactive steps against antisemitism and create an environment where Jewish students feel safe, without the need for security, to openly identify themselves without fear of harassment,” Pearl wrote.
“When they can do so,” Pearl added, adopting the language of Diversity, Equity & Inclusion often applied to other minorities, “it will demonstrate that all students at UVA are genuinely valued, supported, and feel a sense of belonging.”
James A. Bacon is executive director of The Jefferson Council. This article has been republished with permission from the Jefferson Council blog.
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